Product Transparency

EPDs/HPDs

Environmental Product Declarations, or EPDs, are documents that summarize the results of a life cycle assessment (LCA) for specific products. These declarations have been compared to the nutrition label on food packaging because they present concise information to help consumers make better-informed product decisions. EPDs describe the potential environmental impacts of a product across a specified list of environmental impact categories. The latest USGBC green building ratings program-LEED v4-includes credits for buildings that use products for which EPDs have been developed. Find out how steel can contribute to a LEED v4 project.

Health declarations-such as Health Product Declarations, or HPDs-and Cradle-to-Cradle's Material Health Certificates were developed to expose the potential human health impacts of products used in building construction. They attempt to provide a transparent path to divulging all of the ingredients used in products and their related health hazards. LEED v4 includes additional credits for buildings that use products for which specific health declarations have been developed. Furthermore, ASTM is in the process of developing an alternative health declaration, called a Product Transparency Declaration (PTD).

The following EPDs are the most current. They are available for free download: